Security Blanket
by Samayla
Summary: There just aren't enough blankets to go around following the flight from the Misty Mountains.


Thorin shivers as Bilbo shifts yet again. For a creature famed for its love of comfort, the hobbit makes an infuriatingly uncomfortable sleeping partner – all twisting elbows and kicking feet. Thorin growls and tugs the blanket - one of only seven that has escaped the Misty Mountains with them - back down between their bodies to stave off the bleak chill of the night. The burglar immediately rolls again, stealing the blanket completely. Thorin curses.

A snort of laughter draws his attention across the campfire, to where Balin and Fili are keeping watch. "Switch with me," Thorin hisses. He had volunteered to bed with Bilbo in a fit of guilty gallantry, but surely the debt he owes to the halfling does not extend so far as this, this... torture? He wonders how Bofur or Ori managed to sleep a wink with the hobbit either of the past two nights.

Balin and Fili both laugh this time, but quiet themselves when Bilbo rolls over again, partially unwinding himself from the blanket and elbowing Thorin's sore ribs in the process. "Oh, no, laddie," Balin chuckles quietly. "The sleeping arrangements are quite decided for the evening."

"Besides, Uncle," Fili murmurs through a suppressed smile, "you make a much worse sleeping companion."

"Much," comes a sleepy voice, Kili's, from Thorin's other side.

"You snore," says Fili emphatically.

Kili chimes in again. "Loudly."

"And kick." Dwalin. "Hard."

"Besides, Uncle," says Fili in a mock-soothing tone, "you wouldn't want to hurt Bilbo's feelings, would you?"

"Yeah!" Kili sits up with a grin. "And it's not like he's doing it on purpose. It's, well, it's survival, really. Isn't it?"

Dwalin laughs, earning Thorin another kick from his bedmate. "Exactly. Keep you awake, and you can't murder him in your sleep!"

"You keep this up," Thorin growls menacingly, "and you're apt to find yourselves murdered in your sleep." The others snicker themselves into silence. Once he is sure there are to be no more comments, Thorin rolls over and jerks half the blanket back over himself.

By the time Nori and Bifur get up to relieve Fili and Balin, Thorin has lost the blanket entirely. Following a particularly violent thrash from his bedmate, Thorin surges to his feet, ignoring Nori's raised eyebrow, and stalks off into the brush to relieve himself. He is near ready to strangle the halfling and be done with it.

When at last the cold drives him back to the fireside and the dubious promise of a blanket, it is to find Bifur crouching over a whimpering burglar, stroking his hair and making little shushing noises, to no avail.

"Is he hurt?" Thorin whispers, kneeling down on the hobbit's other side as feelings of guilt and dread immediately assail him. Why had he ever left his side? He'd wanted the tossing to stop, but he had never actually wished the hobbit harm.

Bifur shakes his head. {Bad sleep,} he signs.

Relief washes over him even as a new wave of guilt rears up. He hadn't thought past his own discomfort – how could he have never thought of Bilbo's, especially after all he had done for the company? "I've got him," Thorin murmurs, determined to make up for his blindness. Bifur nods and moves off to return to his watch, but Thorin moves closer to the still-whimpering halfling. The hobbit rolls onto his side again, away from Thorin. The king takes the opening, wriggling quickly beneath the blanket. He pulls the tiny burglar to his chest and hums softly into his ear. Almost immediately, the whimpering stops, and the hobbit snuggles deeper into Thorin's embrace.

"Do you think Ori would sketch them?"

"Hush, Kili. You'll wake them up."

"But, Fi-"

"Shush!"

"I'm going to get Ori."

"It'll be the last thing you do," Thorin growls. He opens his eyes to see his two sister-sons standing over him. Fili has the decency to look somewhat abashed at being caught, but Kili is grinning like a madman, like his death just might be worth it if it means capturing the image of his uncle wrapped around a hobbit. For, he finds, Bilbo is still nestled securely in his arms.

Almost as if he senses Thorin's gaze, Bilbo stirs. Then he freezes, his eyes wide. "Uh, Thorin?"

"You had a nightmare," Thorin grumbles by way of explanation. He surges to his feet abruptly and sets the hobbit on his own. He does not speak to him the rest of the day as they travel.

That night, as the company retires, Thorin is dismayed to find that the other dwarves have all paired off with one another. He quietly tries to bully his sister-sons into trading with him, but they blatantly refuse, Kili with another reckless grin. The pair have obviously gotten to Ori as well, because the scribe merely blushes and mutters something about promising to help rebraid Dori's hair. If even Ori refuses to switch bedmates with him, then there is little hope of any of the others giving in, so he gives up the cause as lost.

Thorin puts off going to bed as long as he reasonably can. He stokes up the fire and gathers more wood. He double and triple checks the perimeter of the camp.

"Thorin Oakenshield," Gandalf intones from the shadows, wrapped in his cloak against a tree, "I will not have your foul mood darkening our skies tomorrow. Go to sleep. It will be your turn to keep watch soon enough."

Bilbo coughs as he approaches with the blanket they are to share. "So, uh, looks like we're sharing again," he says without meeting Thorin's gaze. What does everyone think happened last night?

"It would appear so, halfling." He takes the blanket and gestures for the hobbit to lay down first. They lay so far apart that the blanket barely covers even half of either one of them. It isn't long before Thorin becomes aware of the hobbit's shaking. He isn't much warmer, himself.

Suddenly, Bilbo is there, wrapping his arms around Thorin's middle and burying his face in the fur of his overcoat. Thorin pulls the blanket over the pair of them with a resigned sigh and wraps his arms around his burglar.

Two days later, Thorin discovers a sketch in his saddlebag. Ori won't meet his gaze for a week, but Kili grins like a proud papa.


End file.
